


so familiar a gleam

by tommyandthejons



Category: Crooked Media RPF
Genre: F/F, always a girl Lovett, dc era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-23
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2020-01-12 10:48:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18445001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tommyandthejons/pseuds/tommyandthejons
Summary: Lovett and Emily meet a little differently (featuring always-a-girl Lovett).





	so familiar a gleam

**Author's Note:**

  * For [celli](https://archiveofourown.org/users/celli/gifts).



> Dear Celli, you had so many great prompts, I felt spoiled for choice, but couldn't resist the combination of always a girl Lovett and imagining an alternative meeting for Lovett and Emily. I hope you enjoy this!
> 
> Many thanks to my betas who couldn't have been more generous with their time and who contributed some of the best ideas and lines.
> 
> Keep it secret, keep it safe.

Lovett didn’t really remember much about the first time she met Emily. It was at a party at 1309 that Lovett hadn’t realized was going on until she’d wandered out of her bedroom. She was pretty sure the guys had actually mentioned it, but she’d been working on a speech for 24 hours straight and hadn’t really been paying attention. When she’d gotten home from work, she’d crashed, fallen asleep in her very work appropriate-- no matter what Favs said-- t-shirt and had woken up to the sounds of loud music. She might have gone back to sleep, if it weren’t for the sudden overwhelming realization of just how hungry she was. She rolled over and looked at her alarm clock, blinking until the numbers made sense. It was only 7, surely it was early enough for her to sneak down, grab some food, find her earplugs and go back to sleep without getting stuck at a stupid party she didn’t want to go to in the first place.

She threw on some jeans and wandered downstairs, completely unprepared for the vision of an absolutely beautiful blonde doing a number on a can of whipped cream that had Lovett wondering if she was still asleep, even as she surreptitiously tried to finger comb her hair so it wasn’t all sticking up wildly. If she was asleep, she was pretty sure her subconscious was letting her know just how badly she needed to get laid, and given the terrible dating streak she was on, a sex dream might be the closest she was going to get. The blonde pulled the can away from her mouth and swallowed, then seemed to catch her staring, of course, because even in her dreams Lovett was totally inept. Though, truthfully Lovett was pretty sure it wasn’t a dream: she wasn’t that lucky. In a dream, she might have had a shot. Before she could skulk back up to her room, Dream Girl shot her a mischievous grin and started shaking the can.

“Want some?” she asked, holding out the whipped cream like an invitation-- Lovett was pretty sure the whole thing belonged in some kind of straight guys’ porn video that she would never star in or even watch, but she also made it a rule never to say no to whipped cream, so instead she said, “uhhh.”

It was apparently close enough to an affirmative for Dream Girl to hold the whipped cream can up to her mouth and squirt some in-- there were phones out, of course, because none of the bros seemed to have any idea of discretion and Lovett found herself threatening, “if any of those end up on the internet,” with a mouth full of whipped cream, as her dream giggled.

The next morning she had an aching head and too many missing memories. The one memory she did have was of deciding that whipped cream, or at least hanging out with the girl holding the can of whipped cream, was much more important than heating up leftovers, which, given her current headache, had been a mistake. She consoled herself with the thought that had she done anything truly worth worrying about, the guys would have already woken her up to give her shit about it.. 

\--

Lovett remembered the second time she met Emily much more clearly. She’d been stood up by a blind date she hadn’t even wanted to go on, though maybe that was for the best despite Favs’ strange insistence about the whole thing. Lovett didn’t make a great first impression on her best days, let alone after a day of rewriting hell. It had been the sort of day when the corrections to the corrections had the latest draft looking more like the first draft and she wanted to pull her hair out in frustration. She said as much to Favs and when he laughed as if she was joking, she said, “Don’t think I won’t do it. I’ve done the buzz cut before.” She snorted at the memory and couldn’t help adding, “It looked about as good on me as it does on you.”

“So great then?” Favs asked with a grin, as he ran a hand over his hair.

“Yeah. Great’s the word I’d choose,” she said sarcastically. She did miss the convenience of it, but even in college she’d barely managed to pull it off. Better to stick to the short curls and call it good.

“Listen, once you finish up the latest draft of that speech, you’re free.”

“Oh, I, uh, thought you could use me for the speech on solar power.” Lovett had counted on them needing her for that speech. It was her get out of the blind date free card. 

“No, I think we’ve got it under control,” Favs said, not meeting her eyes, though why he’d lie about that, she had no idea. “Besides, tonight’s your date.”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.” Lovett knew she didn’t sound convincing, but thankfully Favs let it slide. Lovett could come up with a list of reasons a mile long why she didn’t want to go: disillusionment with the DC dating scene, the likelihood that she was going to run in to whoever it was at the worst possible moment when she was working, the low probability that anyone Favs was friends with had anything in common with her besides maybe an interest in politics.

More than that, there was something about the promise of a future date, a sort of Schrödinger's date-- not that she planned on radioactively poisoning her date. But until she actually went on the date, there was a possibility that she wouldn’t fuck things up by being more honest than she should be or laughing at the wrong thing, a potential for it to go right that would disappear once she was on the date. That potential was why she’d agreed in the first place, but there had been enough time between then and now for that rare moment of optimism to be lost.

The rewrites took longer than expected, but instead of letting her cancel the date like she’d hoped, Favs pushed it back an hour for her. Even then, it wasn’t enough time to make it home and change before the date like she’d planned. As much as Favs gave her shit about wearing t-shirts into work, as if his v-necks were any better, she wouldn’t wear one on a date, at least not when it was at a stupidly uptight DC place far too close to the White House and likely to be full of people she would recognize and wish she didn’t. She ended up having to beg one of Alyssa’s emergency blouses off of her. It didn’t fit quite right-- too tight in some places and too loose in others-- and somehow it left her feeling simultaneously over and underdressed. About the only thing it had going for it was that it was better than the t-shirt she’d thrown on that morning.

Of course to top things off, it started raining in the few blocks she had to walk, so she looked half drowned when she got there. Not that it would really make that much of a difference. She scanned the room, but didn’t see any women sitting alone. When she asked the maitre d’, he looked at her like he had no idea what she was talking about so she went to the bar, planning to text Favs and let him know whoever he’d set her up with had bailed, while getting a well-earned drink.

She was leaning forward to sip at her very full martini without picking it up in hopes of not spilling it all over Alyssa’s blouse. Pulling out the olives might have helped, but she didn’t actually enjoy them all that much and would just as soon leave them in the glass. She’d actually managed to successfully make it past the halfway danger zone and was well into the point where drinking a martini went from something that required finesse to something easy and enjoyable when she heard a cheerful, “Hi!” and nearly upended the glass. Lovett just managed to steady it, only losing the tiniest bit of the martini and turned to find the dream girl from the party last weekend standing behind her.

“Drinking alone?” she asked, but she didn’t sound mean about it. 

Lovett was licking the spilled martini from her hand and when she caught the girl staring, she made it showier, running her tongue farther up her thumb than she needed to as if to prove that she wasn’t embarrassed at being caught.

“Yeah, well, Favs set me up on a date, but I think she must have gotten tired of waiting for me,” Lovett said, pushing the empty stool next to her towards the Dream Girl. “Lovett.”

“I remember,” she says with a smile. “‘Jon, no h, which I know is a weird name for a girl but it’s my name’,” she recited, which meant Lovett must have subjected her to that rant at some point during the party. She didn’t offer her name. Lovett would try to push through but it wasn’t like it was going to be any less awkward to ask later, and given that Favs hadn’t responded to any of her texts about the date, it wasn’t like he’d be be any help.

So instead she confessed, “I’m terrible at names.”

“Emily,” she said, holding out a hand. There was a shock when Lovett shook it and it would be so easy to assign it meaning when it was probably just static electricity from shuffling in her seat. Emily was wearing an impossibly tiny dress, and the Taylor Swift lyrics, “she wears short skirts / I wear T-shirts,” immediately ran through Lovett’s mind. She had to fight not to laugh at the thought of Emily dating anyone Lovett would be interested in which reminded her why she was there in the first place.

“It wouldn’t have worked out anyway,” Lovett said picking up where she’d left off, as if diminishing the possibility made it better. She kept trying to be less cynical, but sometimes it was far too easy to fall into old habits. She watched as Emily perched on the stool, back to the bar, looking somehow regal, all her focus on on Lovett. “Pretty sure Favs has no idea what my type is. Probably one of those, ‘I know two lesbians, they should date’ things. The biggest surprise being that he knows two lesbians.”

“Oh,” Emily said, her smile freezing weirdly like she didn’t quite know what to do with that information. Lovett couldn’t believe that she’d given her the “yes, I’m a girl named Jon,” talk and managed to skip mentioning that she was super gay, but if she felt awkward, it wasn’t Lovett’s problem. 

“Anyway, I’ll stick around long enough for another drink, tell Favs it was a failure, and hopefully never go on another blind date again,” Lovett said as she tucked a stray curl behind her ear. Something about how perfectly put together Emily was made her want to see what would happen if Lovett were to rumple her up, made her want to imagine a world in which Emily would welcome that from her. She didn’t think that was a sight many people got to see. Before she could get too distracted with that thought, she said, “Anyway, you probably have better things to do.” 

Lovett had been trying to give Emily a graceful way out. She had fully expected her to leave then, not to swing her legs around and sit properly at the bar, her skirt riding up even higher, enough that Lovett had to fight not to stare. She definitely didn’t expect her to ask, “Mind if I wait with you?” as if she truly intended to wait with Lovett. She must have a table of friends to get back to or something, there was no way a girl like Emily was there by herself. 

“I’m sure your friends are missing you,” Lovett tried again. “Or your date.” She probably was on a date. This wasn’t really the kind of place she could imagine Emily hanging out at for fun, but she could see the future Mr. Emily Whoever thinking it might impress her.

Emily smiled, even if it did seem strangely forced, and said, “Oh, I’m sure they’ll be fine,” which Lovett thought implied friends, her earlier thoughts aside. It wasn’t like Emily had a reason to play the pronoun game.

“Fine, but if my date does show up and she’s hot, you have to pretend you’re not with me. Or maybe that you’re hitting on me and I’m nobly resisting because I have a date. Or--”

Emily holds up a three-finger salute like she’s a Girl Scout. “I solemnly swear if she shows up--”

“--and she’s hot!” Lovett interjected.

“--and she’s hot, I’ll be the best wing woman you’ve ever had.”

Instead of responding, Lovett caught the bartender’s eye and pointed to her martini glass then held up two fingers.

“Smooth,” Emily said admiringly.

“I know, right?” Lovett laughed. “If you were my date, that would have never worked. I’m never that smooth.”

“What if I’m more of a cosmo girl though?” she asked, one eyebrow raised.

“Who says one’s for you?” Lovett shot back, much to Emily’s amusement. When the drinks were placed in front of them, Emily gave Lovett a sidelong glance before deliberately picking up the closest one and taking a sip. Emily’s confidence was completely and totally unfair, a turn on Lovett wasn’t armored against; she took a careful sip of her own drink so she could pretend the warmth she felt in the pit of her stomach was from the alcohol and not the challenge in Emily’s eyes. 

Talking with Emily was enjoyable, more than Lovett expected. Somehow, as the conversation went on, they’d turned so they were facing each other instead of the shelves of liquor behind the bar, and it felt like Emily was moving closer and closer. She kept leaning towards Lovett, almost brushing against her and then stopping short, somehow giving Lovett the feeling that she was concerned about Lovett’s reaction, even if that didn’t make any sense. Lovett almost regretted that she’d set the cap at two drinks because she found the bottom of her glass far before she was ready to go home. Before she could say as much, Emily demanded they order something to offset the martini.

“Lightweight,” Lovett accused, but her stomach rumbled in betrayal of her words, and Emily laughed.

“See, you agree with me!” she said, sounding pleased, and somehow managed to arrange moving them to a table like magic. Lovett found herself stupidly glad she’d switched from her normal Keds into ballet flats before she left the office, particularly given the heels Emily was wearing. 

“Princess,” Lovett muttered, somewhere between an insult and a compliment, but of course Emily heard and refused to let go of it until Lovett repeated herself more loudly, only instead of being insulted, she seemed delighted, even when Lovett added, “I bet birds follow you around and burst into song.”

“Honestly, that sounds kind of creepy,” she admitted after she was done laughing.

“Too Tippi Hedren?” and before Lovett could explain the reference which was dated even for her, Emily said, “Yes!” enthusiastically. “Exactly. Besides, I’m more of a queen than a princess.” 

“I don’t know, you’re a little young for a queen,” Lovett said. A little young for me, too, she reminded herself, even though she knew anything with Emily obviously wasn’t really a possibility.

“I like to be in charge,” Emily said matter of factly, and most likely completely unaware at the warmth that flooded Lovett’s midsection at that.

Lovett nodded. “Dictator tendencies.”

“I’d be a very benevolent dictator.” She brushed her hair off her shoulder for emphasis.

Lovett tucked her leg under her and held out her hands, as if framing Emily for a camera. She closed one eye and looked at her evaluatingly. “Hmmmm… Not a princess, but likes to be in charge, only for people’s own good. Can you do a Russian accent?”

“Da, comrade!”

“Good enough! Okay, czarina, it is.”

“Czarina Emily,” she said. She closed her eyes and leaned back, clasping her hands as if considering it. “I don’t hate it.”

“Well that’s good, since you don’t get a choice,” Lovett said, laughing when Emily stuck her tongue out at her.

As they ate, Lovett catalogued things about Emily she couldn’t help but find adorable-- the way her eyes crinkled when she laughed at Lovett’s worst jokes, the way she had passionate opinions on everything from reality tv to pop music to the importance of trade unions, how she went from seeming pulled together in a way Lovett never felt to being silly and back. Lovett found herself desperately wishing this was the date she was supposed to be on and tried to put the thought from her mind. 

When the check came, Lovett grabbed it before Emily could and waved off her attempt to hold out a card. “Don’t worry, I’m going to make Favs pay since he’s the reason we’re here anyway.” She was looking forward to giving him shit about her disaster of an evening, even if Emily had salvaged it, and harassing him into buying her coffee for a month or two for good measure. Since Emily had played her czarina-in-shining-armor, the least she could do was pay for dinner. Lovett said as much, pointing out that, “if you hadn’t stayed, I would have been eating alone.” She found herself impulsively adding, “Pretty sure you’re better company than my date would have been, anyway.”

Emily tried to insist, but Lovett valiantly held the billfold out of Emily’s reach. 

She was calculating the tip and considering making a not entirely untrue joke that it was one of the few ways she used her math degree anymore-- when Emily said, “Actually,” sounding unsure for the first time all evening, which made Lovett look up at her, pen frozen on the receipt. Emily avoided Lovett’s eyes as she said, “I was your date.”

“But we met before. At the party.” It was easier to cling to the idea that Emily couldn’t have been her date because they’d met than to confront the dawning realization that Emily wasn’t as straight as Lovett had assumed she was. Shit. She’d had a chance. More than a chance, apparently, if Emily’d been her date, and she’d opened her mouth and blown it. She must have, or Emily would have said something earlier, back at the bar. Except if she’d blown it, why was Emily saying something now?

“Yeah, and I thought you were cute so I asked Jon if he could set us up because you passed out before I could ask you myself,” Emily said, like it was somehow completely within reason that Emily had met her on a night that Lovett had gotten drunk on an empty stomach (whipped cream notwithstanding), passed out early, and still came to the conclusion that she wanted to spend more time with her, to date her. And to top it off, Emily had had more than enough time to come to her senses and back out of the whole thing without anyone but Favs knowing, and had instead decided to come clean. Had decided she wanted Lovett to know it was a date.

Lovett looked at Emily, made herself take in her perfectly straightened blond hair, subtle makeup, and fashionable dress then sighed. “Look, this isn’t me,” Lovett said because there was nothing she liked more than ruining a good thing with the truth. It was probably her fatal flaw, her inability to shut up and go along with things when it was in her best interest; she wasn’t sure if she’d ever hated it more than she did in that moment.

“What isn’t you?” Emily asked, tilting her head and radiating acceptance. 

“This,” she said, gesturing around. “This restaurant Favs picked or you picked, I don’t know, fuck, this isn’t even my shirt, I had to borrow it from Alyssa because I wore a science t-shirt to work today and didn’t have time to go home and change.”

Emily leaned forward instead of away like Lovett expected. The only thing she expected less was Emily’s question, “What was on the shirt?”

“That’s not the point!” How was Emily not getting this?

Emily pouted and Lovett muttered, “A Darwin joke,” but refused to let herself be side-tracked by Emily’s delight anymore than she’d let herself think about how kissable Emily’s lips looked when she pouted.

The Taylor Swift lyrics came back to her, ‘She wears high heels / I wear sneakers,’ and Lovett said, “Look, I’m a Taco Bell and Phase 1 and t-shirts kind of girl, I’m not good at this kind of thing, at fancy restaurants and heels and makeup. I’m fine with that. I like that. I like being me.”

“I like you being you, too,” Emily said. “So next time you pick and we can do something that’s you, but I’m warning you, that means I get to pick the date after that.”

“That’s not--” Lovett started, even as the promise of multiple dates rang in her ears.

“I meant it when I said I like you. If you don’t like me, you can say it, that’s fine, I can handle it. But if you do…” Emily trailed off. “You know, when I helped you up to bed, at the party, you told me that if I weren’t straight, you’d ‘rock my world’--”

Lovett groaned because that was terrible, but it sounded exactly like something she would have said, even if she couldn’t remember saying it. Maybe especially because she couldn’t remember saying it.

“-- and I still asked Jon to set up this date, so I don’t think you have to worry about scaring me off.”

Lovett had to admit, it was a pretty convincing argument. “I hope you’re ready for shitty fast food and a roller rink,” Lovett said, giving her one last chance to back out. Better Emily say no now than realize her mistake too late, when Lovett was more invested than she already was.

“I hope you’re ready to cuddle on my couch and watch The Bachelor,” Emily shot back.

Lovett couldn’t help making a face at that anymore than she could stop herself from saying, “Fucking heteronormative bullshit.”

“It’s great and I’ll prove it to you. If I don’t, I promise I’ll still make it worth your while,” Emily said giving Lovett a look that promised quite a bit and had her shivering at the thought. She wasn’t exactly sure what Emily making it worth her while would entail, but Lovett was suddenly regretful that her date was first because she very badly wanted to find out.

“Okay,” she said. “But you should know, I normally don’t give in this easily.”

“You should know I would be disappointed if you did,” Emily said, sounding like she meant it.

Lovett still wasn’t sure Emily realized what she was getting herself into. She met Emily’s eyes and tried one last warning. “You sure? I think the nicest thing anyone’s called me is ‘challenging’.”

“Challenge accepted,” Emily said, and Lovett wasn’t sure if it was the commitment in her voice, or the way Emily reached across the table and placed her hand over Lovett’s, but in that moment she suddenly felt sure that Emily was more than capable of handling anything Lovett threw at her.


End file.
